Recent reviews by Wahfuu

Fellas, is it gay to want to kiss Miquella on the mouth?

I can't get into it

The game's world is beautiful and dripping with style, the atmosphere is cool, the lore is doing some fancy ideas and the plot doesn't seem all that bad, but the gameplay itself is dry.

The combat is so unbelievably bland it ceases to be believed, so shallow and easy that I put 0 points into might and still clubbed enemies to death with a sword because it was still MUCH more effective than spells, the enemy variety (in terms of gameplay) is practically non-existent, and the character building has nothing to chew on.

There's just this... lack of sauce to the game. It's all kind of there, looking pretty, but there's no bite to any of it. It's all so surface-level, toothless. Maybe I get bored too easily, but I sadly can't find the motivation to turn the game back on.

Pretty fun if not moderately forgettable action-platformer. The mechanic of the player being kicked back whenever they shoot a projectile can be maddening, especially at the final boss, but overall pretty fun. Not a long game either. Definitely worth a buy on sale if you have to scratch the platforming itch.

As an aside, the complaints about the difficulty you see in the reviews are extremely exaggerated, this game has maybe one difficulty spike and it's the final boss. I'd call the game almost too easy in many cases but I'm probably a minority.

A great game with an absolutely terrible, abysmal translation. If this game had a better TL and more varied map design besides pick up cargo and kill everybody (with huge maps, that usually involve chasing singular enemies that are hidden in far corners) then I think it'd be one of my favorites.

Still, there's a lot of good. There are a ton of builds playstyles to mess with, customization is through the worth, a lot of difficulty options, little bit of crafting, beast taming, and more goodness splashed in. It's fun.

What spoils this game for me is the sheer amount of story cutscenes and rules text translated TERRIBLY. Every character has the same voice, the writing is awkward and stiff... it reads like barely edited machine translation if I'm being honest. After 80 hours of the story going in circles and nothing really happening besides poor characters being introduced, and struggling to understand various gang leaders motivations or why the setting is the way at all because of how poor the english writing is, I find it hard to continue. It doesn't help that the game feels a bit repetitive at this point, with all the missions being the same variants of each other and the maps being re used.

That being said, if you're someone that loves to tinker with RPG mechanics, you'll probably have some fun with this game. I'm not disappointed I got it, but I am sad that there's a lot of wasted potential. But, so it goes.

Beaten on Maximum Security. This is VERY much a 'mixed' review, but I think someone who hasn't played Dead Space before would enjoy it more than I did.

I'm a huge fan of the Dead Space series, apart from... well, the obvious one. So I was pretty excited about this game. Was it worth it? ...Kind of. Largely, as much as I maybe shouldn't, I'm going to be comparing this game to Dead Space 1 and 2 generally.

Much of my problems come from the fact that I find the game to be a bit of a regression from Dead Space 2, and the game's primary combat loop being unsatisfying to both use and master, and the horror elements being only 'okay'.

This might be a bit of a hot take, but I've always been on the opinion that Dead Space 2 absolutely windmill dunks on Dead Space 1, from horror to gameplay to atmosphere. And the reason for that is because I've always viewed the IP as something more closer to splatter films than I do your typical horror might be. The games have always... not been very subtle. They don't build tension for very long before blaring trumpets and noise at you. Not that the series can't, indeed the abandoned tram in the later chapters of 2 proves it can, but it often is contrasted with limbs and fervor.

Dead Space's horror, has, largely, been about the 'frenzy' form. A confusion of sounds and stimulus and worry of 'what the hell is going to come next'. The pants-♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ moments, as they were, in the original games are when you hear an AI go "lockdown in process." or something similar, as you know the next few minutes of your life are going to involve alot of things trying to eat you. The game's are 'scary', but they aren't about a continual build of tension. This is largely why I think Dead Space 2 is better, with its huge enemy variety (shoutouts to the raptor encounters especially) and better contrast. It leans into the chaos (even if, yes, the iron man stunts are a bit silly, im not gonna pretend they arent) and contrasts it better with nightmare visions, quiet terror. Where as Dead Space 1 likes to >think< its building up tension, but pays it off way too fast and way too often. It has a heightened sense of 'general' tension for most of the game, but there's clear safe rooms, and it often dispels it's own attempts at scaring the player by overplaying its hand.

Now, I've talked a whole damn lot and have only really talked about dead space. What does any of this have to do with Callisto Protocol, beyond the obvious 'the dead space guys made it.' Well, because for all intents and purposes, this game is Dead Space 1.5. It's got that industrial, nostromo-alien feel to it for the vast majority of the game, a lot of the 'they're in the walls/vents/what have you' atmosphere to it, and it has much more of an emphasis on general tension than specific scares. Even the way Jacob is constantly looking over his shoulder reminds me of how Isaac would look in space 1.

And this certainly isn't a bad thing; Black Iron keeps the series speciality of being very well thought out and practical. You can see how the prison functions, even during its destruction. And I think it nails its atmosphere better than Dead Space 1 ever did. The problem is that not only do I feel like it took a step back from Dead Space 2, which meshed its horror elements much better and made them something that made sense for the splatter film type goreshow the games rightfully are, it kept the problems of the original dead space 1.

An example. Early in the game, you are crawling through a small squeeze while you come face to face with a webbed up, infected corpse. You get a pretty good close look at it. The eye of the corpse shoots open to follow Jacob as hes leaving the squeeze. This is a pretty creepy moment, but ruined by the extremely loud blaring of noise and orchestra that happens right when the eye opens. The Dead Space devs struggle to hold it in their pants for longer than a few minutes before needing to shout over the clifftops at that something scary is approaching. It's only when they go after long, singular chapters of quiet that it works. This 'general' tension thats supposed to linger over the whole game never works, because dead space is by its core, a loud splatter film.

So what about the gameplay? A mixed bag. Gone are the inventive and unique armory of Dead Space 1, of mining equipment turned arsenal, or the high powered sci-fi military equipment of 2. Instead we have the most basic, unimaginative weapons possible. Pistol, shotgun, assault rifle. Woopie.

The biggest question mark with the gameplay, however, is the melee system. Essentially the game locks you into a soft QTE with every enemy you face. Everything is dodged by holding a directional button. No timing element. This makes avoiding attacks >extremely< easy when it comes to 1 enemy, barely even a threat. When another enemy gets involved, one of two things happens; the other enemy will sit, and wait its turn like a good little Not!Necromorph, or they will try and hit you during this soft QTE. If they do, and you've already pressed the attack button, then oops, you're getting hit with no input, because once you press the attack button nothing on gods earth is stopping you from finishing it. This leads to the gameplay, especially in the first few hours, to be tedious. Things will only ever hit you if you've accidentally committed to something without seeing an attack or out of vision, because its impossible to fail otherwise. Rarely does damage you receive feel like a mistake as much as it does your little brother taking your controller out of your hands in the middle of a QTE.

Also, sadly, gone is the system of upgrading. Power nodes are gone, instead you inject money directly into the gun to make it stronger. It's not a terrible idea, but I found power nodes to be much more satisfying as a reward for exploration and tinkering around where you maybe shouldn't be. The monetary rewards you get in this game... never feel like enough up until the third act, where it suddenly showers you in it right before the final boss.

So... overall, do I recommend this? I don't know. I can't really help but feel disappointed as someone who likes dead space 1 and adores dead space 2, this game feels like a lot of missed opportunity. But we don't get much survival horror, especially not at this production quality. And while the game is clunky at times and derivative in a bad way in others, it's also artistically sound, with a strong atmosphere and great, haunting area to explore. Maybe that's all you need. I suspect it will be for most people.

A weird ass game with SOUL.

Terraria-ish combat with a lot of build variety by equipping food items. Mostly linear with a little bit of side paths for extra recipes. The story is... much more than you expect from the game, and from the first few hours.

What starts as a truly bizarre game about celebrating cooking and eating things that were all alive, including plants, quickly becomes an existential dread simulator featuring body horror. To say the game undergoes a tone shift isn't quite accurate. It's more like a tone catapult.

The writing can sometimes be a bit too corny as characters will talk at length about >THEMES OF THE GAME<, but it's heartfelt and the characters have great chemistry with each other. The comedy has a lot of good usage of art assets, too. It's a fun, rather breezy ride.

I do think there's more design than what meets the eye in the bosses and platforming, but the player becomes so horrifyingly strong, and easily, that even on master chef it feels like the game falls over without too much issue, the bosses largely because of one food item that lets you delete projectiles via dashing, and the platforming because the obstacles simply aren't threatening enough.

Either way, a fun romp with fun characters and it has Simmer, so 10/10.

This is more of a halfway between a thumbs up/thumbs down. It's certainly not bad, but it is very barren. It felt like upgrading anything else except weapon damage was incorrect, and in doing so made the game extremely easy past the initial wrestling with the controls. The manor has some nice atmosphere to it, but a lot of areas within biomes feel repetitive without solid landmarks, and theres not really... anything to find besides lore notes, and upgrade stones. There's just... not enough 'game' here, I beat it just under 3 hours blind.

I do think its worth checking out, as there are some cool ideas here and it's cheap, but it's nothing mind blowing.

Finished on Master Soul.

Unsouled is a game that I think needed a bit more polish, but still delivers on a satisfying combat experience with a plethora of mechanics to dig your claws into. Theres a lot of minor and major nuance to every attack and move in your arsenal, which is massive. I would have liked to see more harder elite enemies and combinations of those, because many combat encounters can feel quite musou-esque with the amount of violence you dish out on waves of small enemies. The bosses are good and fun almost unanimously, though.

If you're someone who enjoys a difficult combat-focused game you'll probably enjoy this. The camera can be a bit too antagonistic, mind, and the see-through vision through walls doesn'tdo enough. Also I do wish there was a bit... more? Bosses weren't easy, but there was nothing that TRULY felt like it was pushing the system to its peak. Kamas was close, though.

Either way, fun game! Hope theres some dlc for it of some kind.

Game crashes after a minute when trying to use discord streaming for some reason. Also doesn't run too well. Will change this review if either changes.


EDIT: The developers responded to this with a workaround and it works wonderfully. Haven't gotten any crashes, and the game's been pretty good so far. I'll write something bigger when I finish but yeah goodjob.

A linear snore with pretty art and good narration.

The game is practically on rails no matter how much it wants to pretend it isn't; there is almost 0 worthwhile exploration to do, and when there is, barely anything you get feels worthwhile. All of the gear you find in the game is identical outside of differentiating weight/defense ratios.

For a second, I thought there was going to be a basebuilding aspect the game or crafting, but there isn't anything of the sort. The currency in the game feels practically pointless due to how much you get of it, and the 'crafting' is buying a blueprints and giving it to the blacksmith and him giving you an item. There's no input from you. The 'gold' currency is just a 'move the plot forward' currency that you need to do sidequests for, which are almost all entirely mandatory because of it.

The combat is just... okay. It's not bad, but it never evolves from basically the very start. You get a couple tools to play with and differing weapons, but honestly it didn't feel worth it to do anything but use whatever gave the biggest increase in the bar for one-handed/two-handed/-ranged. The combat is too simple and barebones, being the same dodge/punish loop the souls games do but with much simpler attacks on average. If you really enjoy slow paced and methodical pacing though, it could hit for you. But that's all.

So, unfortunately, I just don't see what all the reviews are praising here. The game is pretty and geralts narration is cool, but on a mechanical level the game is a plodding chore without any bite to it, there's not a lot of challenge to be found.

(Disclaimer: It is worth mentioning I didn't finish, so there is a chance the game blew open during the last act I was on after I quit. If so, then I will gladly put on my clown make-up.)